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A Tale of Two Cover Ups

At the outset, I confess that I am a Penn State football fan and have been since about age 7 or 8. That said, I fully accept that, on some level, Joe Paterno failed to do all that he could to protect children from being brutalized by Jerry Sandusky. To what extent will, eventually, be fleshed out through the judicial process.

However, the point of this entry is to discuss the dichotomy between media coverage of two cover-ups: Penn State’s cover up of Jerry Sandusky’s crimes and the Department of Justice’s cover-up of Fast and Furious. As many of you may be aware, CNN showed images of e-mails, allegedly sent between administrators at Penn State, discussing what actions would be taken to address the abuse perpetrated by Jerry Sandusky. CNN aired these during the Anderson Cooper show. If true, the details contained in these e-mails certainly do not paint the school or Paterno in a very good light. It is a legitimate news story and I have no problem with the light being shown on the school and football program, to discover what happened.

That said, there is now evidence that officials high in the Justice Department have engaged in a cover-up of who exactly approved the Fast and Furious program. Chairman Issa made public, via the Congressional Record, details contained in a wiretap application that indicates that high ranking DOJ officials approved of the program. This is completely contradictory to what Eric Holder said, under oath, before Congress. Thus, we have perjury, obstruction of justice and a host of other crimes, possibly including criminally negligent homicide. You would think that CNN would think that this was a tad more important than what may or may not have happened at Penn State in 2001. You would think that some enterprising young producer or editor would want to expose this blatant corruption. However, that is apparently not the case. Apparently, CNN and the rest of the mainstream media has no interest in uncovering details about a program that led to the death of at least 200 Mexican citizens and Brian Terry.

Hence, it seems clear that, over the course of the summer, we can look forward to stories about heat waves, Penn State and occasional hit pieces on Mormonism. I suppose that fits the agenda more than actually reporting honestly about the economy, weak standing in the world or the high crimes and misdemeanors that seem to be eminating from the Department of Justice.